Saturday, April 2, 2005

Religion and friendship

On this day, the day that Pope John Paul II died, it got me thinking about religion and friendship. It wasn't just this but also the fact that I have a REL126 Paper due in the next two weeks.

One of the people that I've come to know after having moved out here [it's going to be 1 year 5 months on Apr-15/05] is Petit-P. He comes to mind because not only have things been a bit weird between us recently but it was thru Pop John Paul II and a Christian meeting in T.O. that we meet. I remember that first time we meet and boy did I ever think he was conservative. He mother was strict with him, insisting that he go to bed really early and given we were on vacation my God. Over the last 1+1/2 I've come to know him. He's growing up. He's certainly a lot taller then he used to be, in fact he's taller then me, but that's not hard. I've come to know some of his family and some of his friends. Everyone is interesting just like any group of people is interesting. Some are judgmental, some are creative, and some are 'cool'. But what's got my attention recently is that being a Christian doesn't seem to make a person a better person. I've always held out that religious people should be better. I don't know why exactly I think that. Certainly history has shown that much violence has been shed in the name of religion, but somehow I continue to think that religious people should somehow be better. I've never had any first hand evidence of this being the case but I still believe and will probably always will. In regards to Petit-P, he's probably going thru a tough time in life adolescence and all. He's recently begun this 'lying' phase which I hate. It seems to have caused a little problem with his mother and me, and I can honestly say I was truly disappointed that he let it go and didn't do the right thing. But then that's what some kids do. No matter how much their parents think their perfect the reality is most are the same and we all go thru the same thing. For the unknown reasons mentioned above I was hoping that he would be a bit different. His mother and him are both religious and as I said I expect these people to be a bit 'better' then the rest. After a recent issue with a computer problem and his mother and him dealing with it really poorly [ed: It's not over but we'll see in the next few weeks how it goes] I kind’ a question why I'm in his life. Since moving out here I've kind have accepted him as a younger brother. It's a been a friendly gesture hoping that if there was anything he needed/wanted and I could help out with that I would. The odd time he's asked for me to take him to different places and we've certainly gone to the odd sporting event here and there. I'm more then happy to drive him anywhere he needs to go as long as I'm not busy with school and/or with friends. Being a computer 'geek'ish person myself I'm always looking to 'download' anything I know to the next generation. I fundamentally believe that it's not worth learning something if you can't pass it onto the next generation. We've built up his web-site and set one up for his mother but lately it's become static. There's some issues stopping me from updating it but there's certainly nothing stopping him. I guess he's not really into it any more. Oh well. The real issue is not the web-site but more of an attitude thing recently. I remember as a child I thought there were three areas to avoid talking about: Politics, Religion and Sex. Why? I always took the 'comedian' perspective and it was only the really intelligent comedians that approached these topics. And from personal experience I could see these topics causing problems when brought up. So I always tried to avoid them. After all there were a lot of other things to talk about so why bother with these. And things went fine for a long time. I think it was also a case a shyness that I avoided conversations as a child as well and therefore these topics weren't approached. Anyway life went on, shyness passed ['ish], and everything became fair game. In fact given the right situation and the right people I'll talk about anything at length. Which brings me back to Petit-P and I. In the beginning we were having some good conversations but now it's becoming confrontational['ish]. He thinks everyone of his friends, "plays for the other team". I don't even know how to address this. Every time it comes up it's kind’a irritating. I don't mind listening to him and commenting but he's going wild accusing everyone of his friends of this. I somehow doubt it. I've meet some of them and they all seem, 'normal'. Who knows. But more importantly who cares. The issue being he seems to be going thru some problems of his own and basically accusing other people of xyz. It's such an immature thing and really irritating 'cause I would expect him to be 'above' it for a multitude of reasons not the least of which would be a religious background.

I only hope things get back on track with him and I because it's troubling to deal with this kind of stuff.